"I hope you are not here because you like to read." It was the opening salvo for my interview with the admissions director at the University of Maryland's Graduate School of Library & Information Services. I don't remember what, or if, I countered. It was 1967.

Answer or no answer I was admitted, matriculated, and graduated. After a long library career, I am now retired and a recent volunteer at NYPL. The admissions director is long gone, but I would like to reply. "I love to read. Did then, still do. And I love to know what people are reading."

Other people and their reading are what prompted the accompanying photo. That serious reader and I were the only two passengers in a car on a stalled # 1 train. When I looked up, I saw him with one of my favorite books. He was my first iPhone photo subject. I asked politely. He assented politely. We had only a few moments to discuss Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking. "Complicated," I said. He agreed.

When I had my interview for volunteering at NYPL, the reading question never came up. Maura Muller, head of volunteer services, was enthusiastic and said, "We are so glad to have you."

Back to that other interview, there's something else I didn't tell the admissions director. To paraphrase songwriter, Stephen Stills, I tend to love the one I'm with. That makes me sound like a real "sixties" girl, but I mean I fall in love with the most recently asked reference question. Bubonic plague in medieval Europe, the opening lineups for the 1968 World Series, or rooftop gardening... I want to run off with each one. I love the search, the puzzle of finding the perfect resource, learning a little along the way, and watching the patron go off do the serious research.

In library parlance, I am a generalist. That makes me especially suited for my volunteer placement at Milstein Division of United States History, Local History and Genealogy. My specific assignment is to work on the Clippings' Files. It's a generalist's dream.

Every library I have ever worked in has kept a clippings' file. It's a collection of local interest, information not easily found in book form or now not necessarily found on the Internet. Included are pamphlets, leaflets, exhibition catalogs, publicity material, post cards, manuscripts, and yes, newspaper clippings.

Milstein's files are no different, except they are specific to the city of New York. Collected, organized, and maintained by professional staff for over 100 years, the project has landed on the back burner.

My newly minted ID gives me access to Stack 3, the home of the bulk of the local history and genealogy collection. Seemingly endless rows of bookshelves march down the middle of the floor with file cabinets on the perimeter. Seven to eight large multi-drawer file cabinets hold the Clippings' Files. Over 700 file folders contain information about the Rockettes, the 1964 World's Fair, street furniture, graffiti and the subways.

I know you are thinking, "Can't I get all this in a Google search? And newspaper clippings... nobody reads newspapers anymore." Let's start with Google. Entering "New York subways" in the Google search box returns 38 million plus hits.

The number of subway clippings don't come close to that Google number, but there are six teeming folders. Over the years librarians have been selecting maps, flyers, and newspaper clippings going back to the opening of the subway in 1904 with an entire folder devoted to the subway strike of 2005 and its leader Roger Toussaint. The subway offers all the great New York drama. There's love, mayhem, labor strife, heroism, and politicians posturing. Rob Scott, the last professional working on the files compiled a list of movies with great NYC subway scenes, and not just The French Connection.

Newspapers and news have always been at the heart of New York's vibrancy. I have begun to keep a list of the newspapers found in the clippings' file. Of special pride are those great daily papers that have disappeared and not found a complete home in the digital world. New York Herald Tribune, the small neighborhood papers, Frank Leslie's Illustrated News, the more recent AM New York, and Village Voice all have something to say about the subways and much more.

On the days that I am not working on the Clippings' Files, I continue my own research project of capturing my fellow New Yorkers reading while riding the subway. There's no perfect book, but Clifton Hood's 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How they Transformed New York is especially well suited for the subway rider. No polite asking now, I just take out my iPhone and look like I’m busy reading my e-mails. The photo ops are limitless. With thanks to my unsuspecting subjects, here aresome recently spotted titles:

• Dodsworth by Sinclair Lewis
• First as Tragedy Than as Farce by Slavoj Žižek
• Vampires don't Wear Polka Dots by Debbie Dadey and Marcia T. Jones
• White Tiger by Aravind Adiga
• Mistress of the Art of Death by Ariana Franklin